Here’s the latest on Games Workshop’s worldwide Warhammer crackdown affecting nearly 200 sellers, freezing bank accounts, and sales platforms.
Updated on July 11th, 2025, by Rob Baer with the latest update from sellers and Games Workshop.
If you’ve checked your favorite online marketplace lately and noticed a few listings mysteriously vanish, you’re not imagining things. Games Workshop just dropped the legal equivalent of an orbital bombardment, suing 280 sellers across the globe and freezing their assets in one sweeping move.
The largest Games Workshop seller crackdown to date has shut down stores, locked accounts, and panicked vendors. Some were clearly pushing counterfeit kits, while others got hit for less obvious reasons, like using the word Citadel in a brush holder listing.
Let’s break down who got caught in the blast radius, the backtracking, why it matters, and what this means for the miniatures hobby overall.
TL;DR
In April 2025, Games Workshop went full legal Exterminatus on the online miniatures market, and no one was safe, not even your brush holder.
If you’re selling Warhammer-adjacent stuff online, even brushes or bits, this case should be on your radar. From surprise lawsuits to frozen PayPals, here’s the drama so far:
- GW filed a massive lawsuit against (originally) 280 online sellers for Warhammer IP infringement; think fake minis, logos, and sketchy product listings.
- In July, GW got the go-ahead to start collecting default judgments against 170+ sellers who didn’t respond.
- On May 27, 2025, the court issued a preliminary injunction, shutting down sales and locking assets.
- Accounts and funds were frozen across platforms like Etsy, eBay, Alibaba, AliExpress, and Wish.
- GW quietly removed some wrongly accused sellers from the case, but the damage (and drama) may already be done.
- Many were asked to pay $2,000 to $10,000 in “damages” by GW’s lawyers… after their assets were frozen.
- Some well-known companies like KR Multicase and Green Stuff World also got hit, raising eyebrows across the hobby.
- Tabletop Tyrant, a UK shop, tried to fight back solo; the judge said companies can’t self-represent. Lawyer up or get tossed.
- With $10k bonds per seller, GW could be on the hook if the court finds overreach, up to $2.8 million in bond coverage.
GW Pushes for Final Judgments in Major Seller Lawsuit
Sellers in the suit were supposed to respond to Games Workshop by June 20, 2025, but many didn’t. That opened the door for GW to start default procedures, with the judge in the case giving the green light to act.
Currently, Games Workshop has until July 22nd to:
explain the damages sought, setting forth in detail why those damages are legally appropriate and how the Plaintiff computed them. If the Plaintiff seeks damages, it must also attach to the motion affidavits and supporting documentation enabling the Court to precisely compute and verify the requested figure.
So, if the last three months of court orders are any indication, nearly 200 sellers may owe Games Workshop some serious coin soon.
Etsy Leads the Pack as GW Cracks Down on IP Offenders in July
On June 24, 2025, a federal judge gave Games Workshop the green light to start locking in default judgments against nearly 170 global sellers accused of IP infringement. Etsy tops the list with 57 defendants, pointing to a wave of 3D-printed minis and fan-made bits that may have leaned too hard on Warhammer branding.
Alibaba and eBay aren’t far behind, with 43 and 40 sellers respectively. The mix of handmade and mass-produced goods shows GW isn’t being picky; they’re casting a wide net.
Known Brands Get Caught in the Net
What’s turning heads is who’s getting caught. Green Stuff World and KR Multicase, both familiar names in the hobby scene, appear to have had eBay listings flagged under the same enforcement push.
While some sellers are likely running straight-up knockoffs, others fall into murkier or perhaps even innocent territory.
China has the highest number of named defendants, but sellers from the UK, Australia, and Turkey also made the list, reminding everyone that IP enforcement may now be a global game.
Games Workshop Nukes 200+ Online Sellers
On May 27, 2025, a federal judge in Florida handed Games Workshop a legal win against more than 200 defendants, the vast majority of whom seem to be Warhammer counterfeit sellers. The Judge granted a preliminary injunction against these sellers.
Overall, these weren’t just hobbyists with a few extras lying around. They were running storefronts on Amazon, eBay, AliExpress, Wish, and Etsy, pushing fake Warhammer gear like it was no big deal.
Spoiler alert, it was a big deal. The court hit them with a preliminary injunction that restricts the defendants from:
- Selling, distributing, advertising, or offering any goods using the Warhammer Marks or confusingly similar trademarks.
- Hiding, moving, or destroying counterfeit goods and related business or financial records.
This isn’t just bad news for fake Warhammer sellers. It could rattle smaller resellers too, especially those juggling unofficial bits or mixed inventory.
The original suit targeted over an initial tally of 280 sellers, but, as we reported, many seem to have been caught up in this by accident. The good news is that they didn’t call out 3D printing bits or fan art, but the message still hangs in the air.
The Nitty-Gritty Allegations
The case leverages a controversial Florida legal tactic called the “Schedule A Defendant Scheme” (SAD). This allows a single lawsuit against many defendants for intellectual property enforcement.
Here’s how it played out: GW (through their lawyers the Brickell IP Group ) supposedly did a sort of round of undercover test purchases. Those orders didn’t pass muster. They said the goods were fake, low quality, or designed to imitate official Warhammer products. They may have even contained prohibited had logos, box art, and product names, etc.
Such incidents can cost a company more than just a few sales. The bigger fear that GW is claiming is brand dilution. If people can’t trust the quality of what they’re buying, that hurts those involved in the legit hobby, from independent shops to the players themselves.
In an effort to keep sellers from bailing out, hiding assets, or wiping their shop pages, GW made sure no advance warning was given before a Temporary Restraining Order (TRO) hit.
What the Court Did About It
On April 22, 2025, the court signed off on a TRO as part of the full complaint, and that’s when things got serious. The TRO has been converted into a preliminary injunction as of May 27, 2025.
Here’s what came down:
- Sales Freeze: Sellers had to stop selling anything infringing.
- Asset Freeze: Their financial accounts were locked.
- Expedited Discovery: Marketplaces like Amazon, eBay, and AliExpress were ordered to hand over seller details.
- Third-Party Compliance: Platforms had to freeze and disclose info on the accused sellers.
- Alternative Service: GW was allowed to notify defendants via email and Dropbox links. Yes, really.
- Bond Requirement: Games Workshop posted a bond of $10,000 per seller to cover potential damage if the court later finds they overreached. With 280 sellers, that’s potentially up to $2.8 million in bonds alone, not counting the legal bill.
If you’re thinking that’s a lot of legal firepower over some minis, well, you’re not wrong.
GW Swings, Then Realizes It Hit the Wrong Targets
Games Workshop went full courtroom crusader on 280 sellers for alleged trademark infringement. However, it turns out that several dozen of them were totally innocent. Cue the awkward “oops” emails.
Several dozen sellers, who were perhaps victims of Games Workshop’s overreach, managed to wriggle out of the net. Their complaints were quietly removed. Which is nice… but doesn’t exactly fix the mess for the other handful that were also unfairly targeted.
Since we first reported on this legal sweep, a dozen or so sellers have reached out to us, all saying the same thing: “We got hit too, and we’re not even sure why.”
Like mentioned in the No guts, No galaxy Warhammer mech Battletech video, some of them didn’t reply by the May 12th deadline, not out of defiance, but because they had no idea they were even on the hit list.
No formal notice, no friendly email, just radio silence… until they saw their PayPal frozen and their listings wiped.
Most have indicated that they have been asked to pay between $2000 and $10,000 in “damages” by the Brickell IP Group (after their assets are frozen, mind you). Some have even taken to Reddit to ask for legal advice.
Yup, GW froze accounts, locked up funds, and threw sellers into legal limbo… after forgetting actually to proofread their work. Then they quietly started backpedaling. If you were wrongly caught in the net, congrats. You might be getting dropped from the suit (and maybe a half-hearted apology to go with it).
That’s where the $10,000 bond per seller matters. If any of these claims are ruled excessive or unjustified, those funds could help cover damages to wrongly targeted sellers.
This part gives strong “Spots the Space Marine” vibes, if you remember the infamous takedown campaign from a decade ago. Add in the recent YouTube copyright strikes, and you’ve got a pattern. Potential over-enforcement with a side of PR misfire.
Full story here if you want the legal drama in all its grimdark glory.
No Lawyer? No Entry.
TL;DR
- Tabletop Tyrant tried to respond without a lawyer. Judge said “nope.”
- Businesses must be represented by counsel, pro se is off the table.
- This makes things a lot harder for the 200+ mostly out-of-country defendants.
- The May 27 preliminary injunction still stands.
In a recent twist that’s got more bite than a Carnosaur, the court even smacked down an attempt by UK seller Tabletop Tyrant to represent itself in the Games Workshop lawsuit case. The reason? Businesses can’t pull a DIY legal move.
Judge Altman cited Palazzo v. Gulf Oil Corp., a case that basically says: if you’re a company, you’re not a person, and you don’t get to argue in court without a lawyer.
PAPERLESS ORDER striking Motion to Dismiss. The Motion was filed on behalf of Defendant Tabletop Tyrant by “Dustin Smith, Company Director.” Motion at 2. But businesses like Tabletop Tyrant are “artificial entit[ies]” that “cannot appear pro se, and must be represented by counsel.” Palazzo v. Gulf Oil Corp. , 764 F.2d 1381, 1385 (11th Cir. 1985). If Tabletop Tyrant wishes to appear in this case, it must hire a lawyer to represent itself. Any future pleadings filed by an officer or employee on behalf Tabletop Tyrant will be stricken. Signed by Judge Roy K. Altman on 6/4/2025.
That’s bad news for the 200+ defendants now sweating under a preliminary injunction from May 27th. A lot of these are small shops based outside the U.S., and this ruling just made it a lot trickier (and pricier) for them to respond.
It’s tough enough wrangling customs and shipping, now toss in U.S. legal fees?
Final Thoughts
Let’s be real: counterfeits do real damage to the hobby. If you’re printing knockoffs and slapping a GW logo on the box, you’re not the good guy in the story. However, when enforcement becomes sloppy, targeting harmless hobbyists for minor infractions, such as naming conventions or a single category image, that’s a problem too, we think.
Games Workshop’s legal action is drawing a hard line. Whether it’s the right one, and whether they’ll keep the community on their side while doing it, is still an open question.
Latest GW Takedown of YouTube Creators
Hmmm. Maybe GW sell your crap at reasonable price and actually restock your crap And maybe you won’t as many try to profit of your crappy business practices. Just a thought.
Where do we find this list of affected sellers? Some random messaged me on Instagram claiming I was one of them but neglected to provide links or proof, and I haven’t heard anything from Games Workshop
email me your business name 🙂
They pulled all my ebay listing of stationforge minis because I used the warhammer category on ebay. Apparently they own the entire category and it you post in it it’s a trademark violation. GW doesn’t care about fair use, only power abuse.
Yes they did the same to me few years ago. They own the category, that’s how you keep 97% of a market against all anti trust law of the world…
Doing so you don’t need to improve the quality of your games and you can keep rising prices^^ The wonderfull GW world or how to kill a hobby.
They did this on the quiet side 20 or so years ago, it forced at least 6 game stores out of business, in three states. The diffrence now is is the speed of the internet, and that game shops talk more, and I think it as stupid now as it was then.
I operate a successful print business where I pay every designer and take care to not list anything that I think might be objectionable to GW. GW has still consistently shown that they are bad-faith actors who feel it is their right to issue takedowns of anything that even sniffs a space marine aesthetic. Their behavior, as my lawyers specializing in IP law put it, is “appalling”
I support any company’s right to protect their IP. But make no mistake, 90% of GW’s IP protecting activity is simply anti-competitive law-breaking.
Yeah like having more than 60% of illegal in EU (GW got 97%).
And 95% of their so called IP comes from other universes (Dune, Starship trooper, Lotr, Dune again, etc…).
Correction, in my previous post I said Armorcast made the resin “Gobsmasha” tank for the Orcs back in the ‘90’s…it was a company called Epicast. (My bad)
Bwahahaha—you mentioned “act of good faith” and GW in the same sentence! We long-in-the-tooth hobbyists have seen this from GW before. I agree, protect your IP as there’s far too many copycats and fakes out there. But would it hurt to actually mass produce product and work well with multi-channel distribution? Does everything have to be limited release? Ex. You can’t buy a Horus Heresy Series novel as they’re all out of print save the first few books. Print Second or third editions please. Or too many models that never made it to the table top in one game but did in another scale like in old Epic Space Marine —has there ever been a plastic Orc Gobsmasha kit*? If people can’t get what they want they’ll make it themselves (kitbash/3D print) or they’ll go somewhere else. Sadly I’m just not surprised here.
*Epic scale 6mm had the Gobsmasha tank in hot metal, ArmorCast made a resin version back in the ‘90’s under license from GW for the larger WH40k scaled game. No plastic kits as I recall.
Im proud owner of over 10,000 dollars worth of GW product. Thanks to 3d printing it only cost me 1k. The writing is on the wall.
I’m a loyal fan of games workshop and I love the style of there model’s and I would be Hart broken if I’m paying gw price’s and I’m getting counter fit goods so I think gw are doing the right thing I’ve even heard horror stories of people purchasing Warhammer stuff and the box has been re-sealed with empty sprues in the box and none of the bits are not left on them from seller’s on lagit selling site’s so I say if the sellers being sued haven’t done anything wrong then they have nothing to fear from this but if they are braking the law then they will be dealt with
I don’t see a problem with this. Thievery should be put through the wringer regardless. I’ve always loved GW since I’ve started playing.
They respond to their gamers like the next day…. even in video games. They’ve righted their wrongs like mis- marked packages. Messed up my order once and I went back the next day they gave me a set of lions (old school elven set) and some paints because they gave me the wrong elf. They were super awesome in every transaction. So I think the community should calm the hell down, they’re doing what’s best for their business which will reflect in prices and better quality products. It will also help us all make sure we have the official Warhammer 40k and not knock offs…
They’re suing the guy for selling a magnet for a figure called Warhammer, which he made before GW even existed. And he had to pay a thousand dollars to get out of that case. But yeah, GW didn’t do anything wrong… Next time, they should sue the creator of Dune for stealing his intellectual property 30 years before GW
stoleclaimed it…GW is suing people for selling paint pots, brushes, magnets, and items like cosplay which they do not sell and do not have copy right on just because the word warhammer is in the page… people can sell aftermarket parts for car brands they do not own, people can also sell brushes, bits, ect for use with warhammer so long as they dont clame to be GW’s brand.
I hate how right you are